Comedy College was absolutely worth my time. The student comedians did not disappoint.

Comedy College is through the Honors Program and taught by professional speaker and entertainer Gavin Jerome and economics professor Peter Orazem. Jerome works with the students for weeks, teaching them to write jokes and put them together to make a bit. The course would not be possible without Orazem or Jerome’s experience.

“It’s all because of Dr. Peter that we could put this together,” Jerome said. “The honors program knew how funny he was and asked him if he could run a class, and he led them to me since I had taught a comedy class he took. They then asked me to put this all together, and of course I said yes. You don’t get an opportunity to work with young minds that often.”

I, of course, asked him who his favorite act was, and he responded with that is like asking The Beatles to pick their favorite song.

“I love the students who show the most growth,” Jerome said. “Even if they weren’t the crowd favorite. When I see them work hard and still be nervous, and then get up there and kill it…I’m just ,so proud of them all.”

One of those nervous students was Emily Makinster, freshman in mechanical engineering.

“I was just so nervous because you had to have original material and it’s a lot harder to write than you think. I just went up there and put on a confident face, and it was a lot of fun,” Makinster said.

Both nights of the show were solid, though I thought the second night showed a better variety. One of my favorite acts from the first night was Austin Dorenkamp, senior in computer engineering. He opened up the show both nights, which is incredibly difficult to do. Dorenkamp had to open again the second night because the performances were filmed, and the camera recording that night’s entertainment had glitched during his the first performance.

Dorenkamp was the best act of the first night, making jokes about education and Iowa State. Then on domestic terror attacks that happen everyday, from biological warfare to people farting in elevators. He ended with a bit about comparing and contrasting girlfriends with used cars, and he killed it.

The other interesting act from the first night was Chris Duncan, freshman in software engineering. He got up on stage and openly elicited that he was going off of the top of his head. And yet, it felt like he was prepared, due to his comedic personality.

“I did the improv because it’s what I’m most comfortable with,” Duncan said. “I watched the other acts and when it was almost my turn, I had 45 seconds to think of something funny. I just thought about some themes I had gone over during the year and went with it.”

The second night featured five more of my favorite acts, ranging from race jokes to accents and storytelling.

The best female artists went on the second night, but one rose above the rest. Tara Workman, freshman in linguistics, began making jokes about stereotypes that Americans have about different Asian cultures because she is a Chinese American. She began her bit speaking in a believable accent and poor english, but then completely changed when she spoke in a normal American accent for the rest of her bit. “Just kidding, you guys, I’m from Omaha.” With that twist she only got better from there, with jokes that brought her act full circle.

She was great, but the consensus favorite and the best act of either night was Davis Patton, freshman in advertising. He made fun of himself and his habits, then turned his habits into addiction, specifically addiction to Netflix. He went on to compare Netflix to a real drug addiction, acting as though he were a helpless customer to a shady dealer for his favorite shows.

Patton then gave us his most awkward moment in life, when he mumbled to his girlfriend while hugging her “I have to go, Sydney.” She heard “I love you, Sydney.” That was enough to have been my favorite, and then he strapped on his guitar. He sang a parody of NSYNC’s Bye Bye Bye, which he called WiFi. In this parody he made fun of generation Y and our technology obsession. It was fantastically written, not to mention he had a great voice.

Like I said, it was completely worth my time to spend an hour or so each night watching honors students being funny. The students that commanded the stage, had confidence, and who of course had funny material, rose to the top and got me excited to attend the next show in the spring.